Back
For best output, select "Paper Size" as "A4" and "Margin" as "0" or "None".
To save or print to PDF, please select Print Destination > Save as PDF, enable Background Graphics under "More Settings", then click "Save".
During the congress, E-Posters will be accessible to all participants on the congress website 24/7, as well as in the E-poster stations in the congress center.
Preparing your E-Poster
Please review the E-Poster format requirements carefully when preparing your E-Poster. Should your E-Poster not meet the mentioned requirements, it may not be displayed as described above.
E-Poster Submission Deadline
Please prepare and upload your E-Poster no later than March 14, 2026 11.59PM CET. After this date, you will no longer be able to prepare and upload your E-poster and it will not be displayed and accessible on the congress website.
Please follow the instructions below to input your abstract title.
Abstract titles should be brief and reflect the content of the abstract.
The COVID-19 pandemic wreaked immense havoc, and several countries including India, implemented lockdowns to prevent largescale viral transmission, in the year 2020. These measures severely limited the capacity of hemodialysis centers to cater to patients of end stage kidney disease, in part due to the restrictions on transport and reduced availability of dialysis consumables. It is now five years since the first wave of COVID-19 but it is still unclear whether dialysis initiation during that time, has had any effect on short and long term survival. The present study examines the clinical outcomes of patients from a single study center catering to low socioeconomic status patients from rural South India, who initiated maintenance hemodialysis via government-funded schemes in the months of March to November 2020, and compared to audit information available from the same center, from the year 2015 onwards.
The present study was retrospective, with dialysis, hospitalization and vascular access-related details obtained from hospital information system and dialysis records. Patients who recovered renal functions, were lost to follow-up, had incomplete datasets or shifted to another centre permanently, were excluded from the analysis. All statistical analyses were performed using SPSS version 26, IBM Inc.
A total of 58 patients were included in the study. The median age of the study participants was 52 (19-64) years and 8.6% were female. Upto half of them were hypertensive and nearly 40% were diabetic. All the patients were beneficiaries of state governmental dialysis funding scheme. Upto 40% of the study participants were under nephrologists’ care prior to dialysis initiation, but arteriovenous fistula (AVF) creation prior to dialysis initiation was practised in only one case. The rest of the patients initiated dialysis via internal jugular vein catheter and shifted to AVF at a median of 2 months later. The 1-year survival was 60.3% (35 of 58 patients). The 1-year survival was lower in 2020 than in the year 2018 (67%) but statistically insignificant (p=0.34). Also, patients initiated on hemodialysis during the first wave COVID lockdown period had only 13 survivors at the end of the 5-year period (22.4%), with a median duration on dialysis of 17 (9-44) months. A total of 164 emergency hospitalizations were recorded in 1539 patient-months. Fluid overload (in 26 patients) followed by sepsis (in 3 patients) and cardiovascular events (in 2 patients) were the most common attributed reasons for hospitalization. Kaplan-Meier survival analysis showed an estimated median survival of 17 months and this is depicted in Figure 1.
The findings from the interim analysis of the present study demonstrate dismal one- and five-year survival rates among a group of rural patients belonging to low socioeconomic status being dialyzed under government funded schemes, who were initiated during the first wave of the COVID pandemic. Further analyses planned, include comparisons for cause of death and hospitalizations in a 5-year period starting from March 2020 versus those initiated between 2015-2020.
